COMMON WEAKNESS ENUMERATIONDraft

CWE-491

Public cloneable() Method Without Final

A class has a cloneable() method that is not declared final, which allows an object to be created without calling the constructor. This can cause the object to be in an unexpected state. (Roles: Common-Name, Attack-Focused)

Abstraction

Variant

Structure

Simple

Likelihood of Exploit

Medium

Understand the problem

What is the problem?

A class has a cloneable() method that is not declared final, which allows an object to be created without calling the constructor. This can cause the object to be in an unexpected state. (Roles: Common-Name, Attack-Focused)

Terminology

Alternate terms and usages

Object Hijack

Root cause

How and when does the problem arise?

Lifecycle phase

Implementation

Risk

What does successful exploitation lead to?

Unexpected StateVaries by Context

Affected security scopes: Integrity, Other

Defence

How is it prevented and fixed?

Implementation

Implementation-phase defence

Detail
Make the cloneable() method final.

Verification

How is it detected?

Automated Static Analysis

Automated static analysis, commonly referred to as Static Application Security Testing (SAST), can find some instances of this weakness by analyzing source code (or binary/compiled code) without having to execute it. Typically, this is done by building a model of data flow and control flow, then searching for potentially-vulnerable patterns that connect "sources" (origins of input) with "sinks" (destinations where the data interacts with external components, a lower layer such as the OS, etc.)